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Portrait
of Christopher Hitchens
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An interview with
Christopher Hitchens ("Moral and political collapse" of the Left in
the US)
Washington
Prism.org ^ |
June 16, 2005
Christopher
Hitchens is one of America's and the English speaking world's leading public
intellectuals. He is the author of more than ten books, including, most
recently, A Long Short War: The Postponed Liberation of Iraq (2003), Why Orwell
Matters (2002), The Trial of Henry Kissinger (2001), and Letters to a Young
Contrarian (2001). He writes for leading American and British publications,
including The London Review of Books, The New Left Review, Slate, The New York
Review of Books, Newsweek International, The Times Literary Supplement, and The
Washington Post. He is also a regular television and radio commentator.
For many
years, Hitchens was seen as one of America's leading leftist commentators.
Shortly after the September 11 attacks in the United States, he began publicly
criticizing fellow leftist intellectuals for what he viewed as their
"moral and political collapse" in their failure to stand up to what
he saw as "Islamo-fascism". He publicly feuded with many of America's
leading leftist intellectuals about the war in Iraq, which he supported, much
to their anger. He subsequently resigned from his position as a columnist for
the Nation, America's leading leftist magazine, in protest.
Born in
England, Hitchens has lived in the United States for more than twenty years. He
is one of America's most recognizable intellectuals and has taught as a
visiting professor at the University of California, Berkeley; the University of
Pittsburgh; and the New School of Social Research. He spoke with Washington
Prism at his home in Washington D.C.
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What nobody in authority
thinks us grown up enough to be told is this:
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Q - Your
much-discussed separation from the American left began shortly after the
September 11 attacks. What prompted your displeasure with the left?
A - The
September 11 attacks were one of those rare historical moments, like 1933 in
Germany or 1936 in Spain or 1968, when you are put in a position to take a
strong stand for what is right. The left failed this test. Instead of strongly
standing against these nihilistic murderers, people on the left, such as Noam
Chomsky, began to make excuses for these murderers, openly saying that Bin
ladin was, however crude in his methods, in some ways voicing a liberation
theology. This is simply a moral and political collapse.
But its not
only that. It’s a missed opportunity for the left. Think of it this way: If a
group of theocratic nihilists drive planes full of human beings into buildings
full of human beings announcing nothing by way of a program except their
nihilism and if they turn out to have been sheltered by two regimes favored by
the United States and the national security establishment, Pakistan and Saudi
Arabia to be precise, two of only three countries to recognize the Taliban, and
if Republicans were totally taken by surprise by this and if the working class
of New York had to step forward and become the shield of society in the person
of the fire and police brigades, it seemed to me that this would have been a
good opportunity for the left to demand a general revision of all the assumptions
we carried about the post cold war world. We were attacked by a religious
dictatorship and the working class were pushed into defending elites by the
total failure of our leadership and total failure of our intelligence. The
attack emanated partly from the failure of regimes supported by that same elite
national security establishment– Pakistan and Saudi Arabia. If the left can’t
take advantage of a moment like that: whats it for? whats its secularism for?
Whats its internationalism, class attitude, democracy for?
You don’t get
that many measurable historical moments in your life, but you must recognize
them when they come. This was one of those moments and the left collectively
decided to get it wrong and I realized at that moment that, to borrow a slogan
that slightly irritates me, but is useful: "Not in my name.” I'm not part
of that family. I wanted to force a split, a political split on the left to
which a small extent I think succeeded. Today, there is a small pro-regime
change left and I'm a proud part of it.
Q - It seems
that the left had less difficulty accepting the war in Afghanistan as they did
the war in Iraq.
That is true,
but of the hard core left it isn’t true. They also opposed the removal of the
Taliban. When it came to using force, the least they did was predict a
quagmire. By the way, there weren't alone. The New York Times did so too. They
said at minimum we would witness another Vietnam, which is a pretty serious
charge to make as someone who believes that then and now the Vietnam war was a
war of aggression and atrocity and racism. When someone says something is
another Vietnam, they better be serious because that’s a serious charge.
But lets look
at the case of Iraq and the left. If you asked someone who has the principles
of a 1968 leftist the following question: what is your attitude to a regime
that has committed genocide, invaded its neighbors, militarized its society
into a police state, that has privatized its economy so it is owned by one
family, that has defied the non proliferation treaty in many ways, that sought
weapons to commit genocide again and cheated on inspections, that has abolished
the existence of a neighboring arab muslim state? What is your view of this as
anyone who is a 1968 leftist? For me, I would be appalled if anyone knew me
even slightly would not guess my attitude. Iraq should have been taken care of
a long time ago. Instead, when I made my view public, I was berated by the left
and my view was seen as an insane eccentricity.
I should also
note that I have friends and comrades in the Iraqi and Kurdish left going back
at least till the early 1990s. For me, supporting the war was an elementary
duty of solidarity. I said: I'm on your side and I’ll stay there until you’re
in and they’re out.
Q - If there
was a Democratic president on 9/11, would there have been a difference of
opinion in the American left about the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq?
Not from
people like Michael Moore (the American film director and strong critic of
President Bush), who makes a perfectly good brownshirt [fascist]. Or Noam
Chomsky. No, it would not. To them it would have been further proof that the
ruling class just has two faces and one party. But I think, in the mainstream
of the democratic and Republican parties, you would have seen an exact switch.
Richard Holbrooke’s position (Holbrooke was Clinton's UN Ambassador and is a
leading Democratic foreign policy thinker) would be Dick Cheney’s position. The
ones in the middle would have just done a switch, finding arguments to support
or criticize the war. In fact, I remember that people in the Clinton
administration spoke of an inevitable confrontation coming with Saddam. They
dropped this idea only because it was a Republican president. That is simply
disgraceful. It is likewise disgraceful how many Republicans ran as
isolationists against [former Vice-President] Al Gore in the 2000 elections.
The only people who come out of this whole affair well are an odd fusion of the
old left – the small pro regime change left – and some of the people known as
neoconservatives who have a commitment to liberal democracy. Many of the
neocons have Marxist backgrounds and believe in ideas and principles and have
worked with both parties in power.
Q – In your
book, Why Orwell Matters, you noted that Orwell once refused an invitation to
speak at the League of European Freedom on the question of Yugoslavian freedom
– a cause he believed in. He refused to speak because he felt that the
organization failed to condemn British imperialism in India and Burma. He saw
that as a fatal flaw. Do the neoconservatives have a fatal flaw: on the one
hand supporting Middle East democracy, on the other refusing to condemn Israeli
policies that stifle Palestinian freedom aspirations?
A – Orwell
said, at the time, that he would not speak for any organization that was
opposed to tyranny that did not demand British withdrawal from India and Burma.
He also noted that the liberation of Europe did not include the liberation of
Spain from the fascists or Portugal. He also noted that it had included the
enslavement of Poland.
In the case
of the Palestinians, it is generally true that United States political culture
doesn’t care about the Palestinians. We are taught to think of them as an
inconvenient people who are in the way of Israel and a regional settlement.
They are people about whom something should be done or, more condescendingly,
for whom something should be provided.
I've spent
three decades writing about the Palestinians and publishing a book with Edward
Said [leading Palestinian intellectual and critic of Israel] about it. All
political factions in this country have been lousy on this issue, but none
lousier than the Democratic party. The Democrat party truly is what some people
crudely say: a wholly-owned subsidiary of the Israeli lobby. It is one thing it
has never deviated on: that and abortion. The only two things the Democrats
have never flip flopped about.
The neocons
are honorably divided on Israel. Take Paul Wolfowitz, for example. He is very
critical of settlements and the whole idea of Greater Israel. Whereas Richard
Perle (a prominent neoconservative thinker) doesn’t regard the areas known as
Judea and Samaria (the West bank) as occupied territory. He regards them as
part of a future Israeli state. I'm looking forward to the neoconservative
split on this getting wider.
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"We can't live on
the same planet as them and I'm glad because I don't want to. I don't want to
breathe the same air as these psychopaths and murderers and rapists and
torturers and child abusers." - #ChristopherHitchens
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Q - Some have
said that only columnists and public intellectuals can afford principles,
whereas politicians sometimes must succumb to realism. In your book, Why Orwell
Matters, you admired Orwell because you said that he understood that that
politics are fleeting but principles endure. In our day, can a politician rule
by principle?
A - It
depends on what the principle is. If the principle is that all men are equal or
created equal, I don’t think its possible to observe that principle in
practice. But if the principle is, say, something cruder such as: can we
coexist with aggressive internationalist totalitarian ideologies, then I think
you not only can but you should act consistently against that. Never mind the
principles for one minute, but the lesson of realism is: that if you don’t
fight them now you fight them later.
They
[Islamist radicals or, as Hitchens calls them, Islamo-fascists] gave us no
peace and we shouldn’t give them any. We can't live on
the same planet as them and I'm glad because I don’t want to. I don’t want to
breathe the same air as these psychopaths and murders and rapists and torturers
and child abusers. Its them or me. I'm very happy about this because I know it
will be them. It’s a duty and a responsibility to defeat them. But it's also a
pleasure. I don’t regard it as a grim task at all.
INTERNET SOURCE: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1457374/posts
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